I’m a veteran Chicago-based consumer automotive journalist devoted to providing news, views, timely tips and reviews to help maximize your automotive investments. In addition to posting on Forbes.com, I'm a Contributing Editor for Consumers Digest magazine and write frequently on automotive topics for other national and regional publications and websites. My work also appears in newspapers across the U.S., syndicated by CTW Features. I'm the author of the Automotive Intelligentsia Money-Saving New-Car Guide and the Automotive Intelligentsia series of Sports Car Guides, available via Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble online and at the Apple iBook store. Email me at carguyjim@att.net.

The Safest Cars For 2012

While ongoing advancements in automotive safety (along with mandatory seatbelt use laws and stricter DUI enforcement) have helped drive down traffic fatalities to record lows in recent years, motor vehicle crashes remain the leading cause of death for individuals between the ages of three and 34.

According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, 32,885 people died in motor vehicle crashes during 2010, which represents a 2.9 percent drop over 2009 fatalities – that’s the lowest level since record keeping began in 1949. Still, that means a vehicle-related fatality occurs an average of once every 16 minutes; the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention pegs the cost of medical care and productivity losses associated with motor vehicle crash injuries at over $99 billion, or nearly $500 for each licensed driver in the United States.

Thus it’s no wonder that, according to a recent Consumer Reports survey, 65 percent of respondents said safety was their top priority among all buying considerations, trumping such stalwarts as quality, value and performance. And women, who wield considerable influence in making family purchases, coveted safety even further with 74 percent of female respondents rating it as their top buying concern.

We scoured crash test results and spec sheets to identify the vehicles that do the best job of protecting their occupants in a collision and offer the most advanced systems to help motorists avoid accidents in the first place.

To help safety-minded car shoppers make choices that could save lives down the road, we’ve compiled Forbes.com’s annual list of what we feel are the safest rides on the road among model-year 2012 vehicles.

We began our research with the recently released list of “Top Safety Picks” from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), a non-profit organization funded by the insurance industry. For 2012 a total of 69 cars, 38 SUVs and three pickups made the cut, which includes 18 new recipients. “For the second year running a record number of models qualify as Top Safety Picks,” says IIHS president Adrian Lund. “It’s tough to win, and we commend auto manufacturers for making safety a top priority.”

To qualify as an IIHS Top Safety Pick, a car must garner top scores for performance in front, side, rollover and rear-end crashes based on ratings determined by the IIHS’ evaluations. Vehicles are classified in each category on a basis of “good,” “acceptable,” “marginal” or “poor” performance. Unfortunately, testing is generally limited only to those vehicles having the highest sales volumes, meaning sports cars, exotic models and upper-strata luxury sedans like the Audi A8, BMW 7 Series, Lexus LS and Mercedes-Benz S-Class aren’t included in the IIHS rating system. While we would expect those cars to perform as well – or better – in a crash as any of the 110 cars the IIHS cites as Top Safety Picks, we’ve limited our range of picks to models that sell, at least in their base versions, for $50,000 or less.

Frontal crash tests are performed at 40 mph with instrumented dummies wearing standard three-point safety belts measuring crash forces to the chest, head and legs. In these “offset barrier” tests, only part of a vehicle’s front end hits a deformable barrier that simulates the front of another car or truck. However, be aware that frontal crash tests are only useful when comparing vehicles within a specific weight class. A highly rated subcompact car won’t necessarily perform better in a collision than will a lower rated full-size model. That’s because the laws of physics dictate that larger and heavier vehicles inherently offer greater crash protection than do smaller and heavier ones.

Side-impact tests utilize a moving deformable barrier approximating the front end of a pickup truck or large SUV that strikes a vehicle at 31 mph. Instrumented test dummies are positioned in the driver’s seat and the rear seat behind the driver, with each representing a small female or adolescent child; the IIHS uses smaller dummies here because its data suggests that women are more likely than men to suffer serious head injuries in a side impact (their heads tend to be positioned lower in the window area where they’re more vulnerable). Unlike frontal impact tests, the results of side-impact crash tests can be compared across all vehicle size and weight classes.

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All the cars in our Safest Cars list get top grades across the board in crash tests and offer what we feel is the trifecta of crash protection options–blind spot warning, lane departure warning and collision warning. We’ve had instances where each of these kicked in and can attest they indeed work. There are a number of non-luxury branded cars that offer at least two of three of these systems, including the Ford Taurus, with many more mainstream cars including them for 2013. Expect next year’s safest cars list to be longer and more segment inclusive because of this.

But, as I made in a comment below, you left out the safest car in the world. The 2012 Camaro. It’s the first car that the NHTSA has given a perfect score in every category. No list that excludes that car is even legitimate. You’ve just included all the usual European suspects based on perception and gadgetry.

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The final slide in the “Safest Cars 2012″ gallery is the Volvo XC60 crossover SUV by virtue of safety systems including adaptive headlamps, blind spot monitoring, City Safety and Pedestrian Detection low-speed collision avoidance, high-speed collision warning/avoidance and lane-departure warning. A Driver Alert Control system detects when drivers are tired or distracted.

This article is a crock. The 2011 Camaro was the first car to receive a perfect rating from the NHTSA. It’s one of the safest cars on the road and yet it doesn’t even make this conventional wisdom list. Obviously this list is subsidized by the chosen manufacturers.